Tag: Know Nothings

Chicago Press and Tribune, “The Celtic Invasion,” October 16, 1858

Other Primary Sources

Chicago Daily Tribune, Article about Pinkerton & Co., September 5, 1856

Chicago Press and Tribune, “Abraham Lincoln,” Novemeber 10, 1858

How Historians Interpret

“Like many of his party colleagues, Lincoln anticipated electoral fraud. To Norman B. Judd he expressed ‘a high degree of confidence that we shall succeed, if we are not over-run with fraudulent votes to a greater extent than usual.’ In Naples he had noticed several Irishmen dressed as railroad workers carrying carpetbags; he reported that hundreds of others were rumored to be leaving districts where their votes were superfluous in order to settle briefly in hotly contested counties. To thwart this so-called ‘colonization’ of voters, Lincoln offered Judd ‘a bare suggestion,’ namely, that where ‘there is a known body of these voters, could not a true man, of the ‘detective’ class, be introduced among them in disguise, who could, at the nick of time, control their votes? Think this over. It would be a great thing, when this trick is attempted upon us, to have the saddle come up on the other horse.’ It is not entirely clear what Lincoln intended; the ‘true man of the detective class’ was perhaps a bag man to distribute bribes.’

—Michael Burlingame, A Life, vol. 1 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 1493

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Hon. N. B. Judd Rushville, Oct. 20, 1858

My dear Sir: I now have a high degree of confidence that we shall succeed, if we are not over-run with fraudulent votes to a greater extent than usual. On alighting from the cars and walking three squares at Naples on Monday, I met about fifteen Celtic gentlemen, with black carpet-sacks in their hands.

I learned that they had crossed over from the Rail-road in Brown county, but where they were going no one could tell. They dropped in about the doggeries, and were still hanging about when I left. At Brown County yesterday I was told that about four hundred of the same sort were to be brought into Schuyler, before the election, to work on some new Railroad; but on reaching here I find Bagby thinks that is not so.

What I most dread is that they will introduce into the doubtful districts numbers of men who are legal voters in all respects except residence and who will swear to residence and thus put it beyond our power to exclude them. They can & I fear will swear falsely on that point, because they know it is next to impossible to convict them of Perjury upon it.

Now the great remaining part of the campaign, is finding a way to head this thing off. Can it be done at all?

I have a bare suggestion. When there is a known body of these voters, could not a true man, of the “detective” class, be introduced among them in disguise, who could, at the nick of time, control their votes? Think this over. It would be a great thing, when this trick is attempted upon us, to have the saddle come up on the other horse.

I have talked, more fully than I can write, to Mr. Scripps, and he will talk to you.

If we can head off the fraudulent votes we shall carry the day. Yours as ever A. LINCOLN

Letter to Richard Yates (August 18, 1854)

On June 10, 2013

HD Daily Report, August 18, 1854

Ranking

#15 on the list of 150 Most Teachable Lincoln Documents

Annotated Transcript

Context. In the summer of 1854, Abraham Lincoln was a 45-year-old attorney and former one-term US congressman living in Springfield, Illinois. However, in this letter to Richard Yates, his local congressman and fellow Whig, Lincoln acted and sounded more like a political party boss than anything else. He used this letter to organize Yates’s announcement for his campaign for reelection to Congress. Lincoln wanted to avoid holding a convention to secure Yates’s renomination because the partisan situation that summer was in turmoil, not only over the controversy surrounding the Kansas-Nebraska Act, but also because of the rise of anti-immigrant nativism. Lincoln made reference to coordinating with those so-called “Know Nothings,” in this letter by referring to their local leader, Benjamin S. Edwards, whom Lincoln deemed “entirely satisfied.” The newspapers did announce Yates’s availability the next week, though without mentioning the Whig Party label. He was ultimately defeated in the November 1854 midterm elections. (By Matthew Pinsker)

“I am disappointed….”

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: Lincoln in 1854

: Richard Yates

How Historians Interpret

“Feeling again the joy of political combat, he devoted all his time to the anti-Nebraska cause, except for his necessary commitments to court cases. He became, in effect, Yates’s campaign manager, spending hours conferring with the Whig candidate and advising him on tactics. Learning that English settlers in Morgan County were disturbed by reports that Yates was a Know-Nothing, he drafted a letter denying the charge, which could be distributed ‘at each precinct where any considerable number of the foreign citizens, german as well as english—vote.’ When he heard that Democrats were whispering that Yates, though professing to be a temperate man, was a secret drinker, he recognized that the rumor might cost the Whigs the large prohibitionist vote and sought to kill the allegation. ‘I have never seen him drink liquor, not act, or speak, as if he had been drinking, nor smelled it on his breath,’ he wrote. But then–almost as if he realized that the future would show that Yates did indulge in liquor, to the point of being intoxicated when he was inaugurated as governor of Illinois in 1861—Lincoln carefully explained his own position to a friend: ‘Other things being equal, I would much prefer a temperate man, to an intemperate one; still I do not make my vote depend absolutely upon the question of whether a candidate does or does not taste liquor.'”

—David Herbert Donald, Lincoln (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995), 171

Further Reading

For educators:

Handout –Lincoln in 1854 (Pinsker)

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Hon. R. Yates, Springfield,
Jacksonville, Ill.

August 18, 1854.

My dear Sir:

I am disappointed at not having seen or heard from you since I met you more than a week ago at the railroad depot here. I wish to have the matter we spoke of settled and working to its consummation. I understand that our friend B. S. Edwards is entirely satisfied now, and when I can assure myself of this perfectly I would like, by your leave, to get an additional paragraph into the Journal, about as follows:

“To-day we place the name of Hon. Richard Yates at the head of our columns for reelection as the Whig candidate for this congressional district. We do this without consultation with him and subject to the decision of a Whig convention, should the holding of one be deemed necessary; hoping, however, there may be unanimous acquiescence without a convention.”

May I do this? Answer by return mail.

Yours, as ever,

A. LINCOLN.

Instructions for John Nicolay (July 16, 1860)

“Tell him my motto is “Fairness to all,” But commit me to nothing.”

Ranking

#82 on the list of 150 Most Teachable Lincoln Documents

Annotated Transcript

On This Date

HD Daily Report, July 16, 1860

The Lincoln Log, July 16, 1860

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How Historians Interpret

“It is only this scrap of writing which makes the incident at all worthy of record. There could be no better exemplification of Mr. Lincoln’s character and caution than this short memorandum of instructions. It reflects all his directness of method, all his sincerity of dealing, all his determination to keep free from any entanglements of intrigue, and to expressly avoid any inferential obligations. ‘Commit me to nothing’ is his positive injunction; on the other hand the announcement of his motto ‘fairness to all’ is the promise of that broad liberality which he carried out as President, and through which he maintained the easy party leadership that secured his renomination and re-election.”

–Michael Burlingame, An Oral History of Abraham Lincoln: John G. Nicolay’s Interviews and Essays (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1996), 94.

“Callers who tried to get at Lincoln personally in his temporary capital office were screened first by Nicolay, who was told to schedule interviews only if ‘indispensable’ and to ‘commit me to nothing’ Lincoln did not even write to the vice-presidential nominee whom the convention had selected for him Hannibal Hamlin, a former Maine Democrat, until mid-July.”

–Allen C. Guelzo, Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1999), 248.

“Although concerned with progress in all the Northern states, he focused his attention primarily on the critical West. He urged Caleb Smith to do his utmost in Indiana, believing that nothing would affect the November results in Illinois more strongly than the momentum provided by an Indiana victory in the October state elections. In July, he sent Nicolay to an Indiana supporter who wished to prevent a Bell ticket from being placed on the ballot. ‘Ascertain what he wants,’ Lincoln instructed Nicolay. ‘On what subjects he would converse with me. And the particulars if he will give them. Is an interview indispensable? Tell him my motto is ‘Fairness to all,’ but commit me to nothing.’”

–Doris Kearns Goodwin, T eam of Rivals (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005), 272.

NOTE TO READERS

This page is under construction and will be developed further by students in the new “Understanding Lincoln” online course sponsored by the House Divided Project at Dickinson College and the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. To find out more about the course and to see some of our videotaped class sessions, including virtual field trips to Ford’s Theatre and Gettysburg, please visit our Livestream page at http://new.livestream.com/gilderlehrman/lincoln

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Ascertain what he wants.

On what subjects he would converse with me.

And the particulars if he will give them.

Is an interview indispensable?

Tell him my motto is “Fairness to all,”

But commit me to nothing.

Letter to Owen Lovejoy (August 11, 1855)

“Know-nothingism has not yet entirely tumbled to pieces—nay, it is even a little encouraged by the late elections in Tennessee, Kentucky & Alabama. Until we can get the elements of this organization, there is not sufficient materials to successfully combat the Nebraska democracy with. We can not get them so long as they cling to a hope of success under their own organization; and I fear an open push by us now, may offend them, and tend to prevent our ever getting them. About us here, they are mostly my old political and personal friends; and I have hoped their organization would die out without the painful necessity of my taking an open stand against them. Of their principles I think little better than I do of those of the slavery extensionists.”

Contributing editors for this page include James Duncan

Ranking

#96 on the list of 150 Most Teachable Lincoln Documents

Annotated Transcript

On This Date

HD Daily Report, August 11, 1855

The Lincoln Log, August 11, 1855

Close Readings

Posted at YouTube by “Understanding Lincoln” participant James Duncan, 2016

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How Historians Interpret

“In Quincy at the end of July, the proselytizers managed to convince some western Illinois Whigs, Free Soilers, and anti-Nebraska Democrats to band together on a platform opposing slavery expansion. When Lovejoy proposed that a state antislavery convention meet in Springfield that autumn, Lincoln replied that although he was ready to endorse the principles of the Quincy meeting, the time was not yet ripe for a new party. ‘Not even you are more anxious to prevent the extension of slavery than I,’ he told Lovejoy; ‘and yet the political atmosphere is such, just now, that I fear to do any thing, lest I do wrong.’ The Know Nothing organization had ‘not yet entirely crumbled to pieces,’ and until the antislavery forces could win over elements of it, ‘there is not sufficient materials to successfully combat the Nebraska democracy with.’ As long as nativists ‘cling to a hope of success under their own organization,’ they were unlikely to abandon it. ‘I fear an open push by us now, may offend them, and tend to prevent our ever getting them.’ In central Illinois, the Know Nothings were, Lincoln said, some of his ‘old political and personal friends,’ among them Joseph Gillespie of Edwardsville. Lincoln ‘hoped their organization would die out without the painful necessity of my taking an open stand against them.’ Of course he deplored their principles: ‘Indeed I do not perceive how any one professing to be sensitive to the wrongs of the negroes, can join in a league to degrade a class of white men.’ He was not squeamish about combining with ‘any body who stands right,’ but the Know Nothings stood wrong.”

–Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (2 volumes, originally published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008) Unedited Manuscript by Chapter, Lincoln Studies Center, Volume 1, Chapter 11 (PDF), 1159.

“In the political confusion between 1854 and 1856, anti-Nebraska elements often sought coalitions with Know-Nothings in efforts that became known as “fusion.” Antislavery candidates for Congress in 1854 often received nativist support. In Illinois, candidates in the third, fourth, and seventh congressional districts were greatly aided by Know-Nothing endorsements. Indiana editor and budding Republican politician Schuyler Colfax published anti-Catholic stories in his newspaper. There was some ideological affinity between free soil and nativism. One free-soil paper suggested that the “two malign powers”—Slavery and Catholicism—”have a natural affinity for each other.” On the other hand, many anti-Nebraska leaders deplored the bigotry inherent in the Know-Nothings and were fearful of alienating the crucial support of Protestant Germans.”

–Mitchell Snay, “Abraham Lincoln, Owen Lovejoy, and the Emergence of the Republican Party in Illinois,” Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 22, no. 1 (2001): 82-99.

“The failed Senate election of 1855 forced Lincoln to reexamine his resistance to fusion and to ask whether, once gain, his passion for loyalty had kept him loyal to a losing proposition… when Lovejoy urged Lincoln in August, 1855, to join a ‘fusion’ movement in Illinois, Lincoln patiently explained that ‘not even you are more anxious to prevent the extension of slavery than I,’ but still ‘the political atmosphere is such, just now, that I fear to do any thing, lest I do wrong.’ Later that month, he told Joshua Speed that as far as he was concerned, ‘I think I am a Whig.’ But there were voices all around him which argued that ‘there are no whigs, and that I am an abolitionist, which was just the kind of radical association that any fusion movement was likely to taint him with. One thing which was ‘certain,’ he told Speed, was that he was ‘not a Know-Nothing’ Lincoln ‘opposed Know-Nothingism in all its phrases, everywhere, and at all times when it was sweeping over the land like wildfire,’ Herndon remarked. As Lincoln told Lovejoy, ‘I do not perceive how anyone one professing to be sensitive to the wrongs of negroes, can join in a league to degrade a class of white men.’ Without any identifiable religion of his own, Lincoln shared none of the anxieties of Whig Protestants about ‘political Romanism,’ and found the Know-Nothings, even more than the Calhounites, a standing repudiation of what ‘as a nation, we began by declaring that ‘all men are created equal.’’ That had not prevented the Know-Nothings from trying to recruit him in 1854 as a state legislative candidate, and rumors that he had secretly taken the Know-Nothing oath cost him at least one critical vote in the 1855 senatorial election. If this was the future of fusion, Lincoln was better off staying a Whig, for what that might be worth.”

–Allen C. Guelzo, Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1999), 201-202.

NOTE TO READERS

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Springfield,

August 11- 1855

Hon: Owen Lovejoy:

My dear Sir:

Yours of the 7th. was received the day before yesterday. Not even you are more anxious to prevent the extension of slavery than I; and yet the political atmosphere is such, just now, that I fear to do any thing, lest I do wrong. Know-nothingism has not yet entirely tumbled to pieces—nay, it is even a little encouraged by the late elections in Tennessee, Kentucky & Alabama. Until we can get the elements of this organization, there is not sufficient materials to successfully combat the Nebraska democracy with. We can not get them so long as they cling to a hope of success under their own organization; and I fear an open push by us now, may offend them, and tend to prevent our ever getting them. About us here, they are mostly my old political and personal friends; and I have hoped their organization would die out without the painful necessity of my taking an open stand against them. Of their principles I think little better than I do of those of the slavery extensionists. Indeed I do not perceive how any one professing to be sensitive to the wrongs of the negroes, can join in a league to degrade a class of white men.

I have no objection to “fuse” with any body provided I can fuse on ground which I think is right; and I believe the opponents of slavery extension could now do this, if it were not for this K. N. ism. In many speeches last summer I advised those who did me the honor of a hearing to “stand with any body who stands right”— and I am still quite willing to follow my own advice. I lately saw, in the Quincy Whig, the report of a preamble and resolutions, made by Mr. Williams, as chairman of a committee, to a public meeting and adopted by the meeting. I saw them but once, and have them not now at command; but so far as I can remember them, they occupy about the ground I should be willing to “fuse” upon.

As to my personal movements this summer, and fall, I am quite busy trying to pick up my lost crumbs of last year. I shall be here till September; then to the circuit till the 20th. then to Cincinnati, awhile, after a Patent right case; and back to the circuit to the end of November. I can be seen here any time this month; and at Bloomington at any time from the 10th. to the 17th. of September. As to an extra session of the Legislature, I should know no better how to bring that about, than to lift myself over a fence by the straps of my boots.

Yours truly

A. LINCOLN—

Letter to Fillmore Men (September 8, 1856)

“I understand you are a Fillmore man. Let me prove to you that every vote withheld from Fremont, and given to Fillmore, in this state, actually lessens Fillmore’s chance of being President.”

Ranking

#105 on the list of 150 Most Teachable Lincoln Documents

Annotated Transcript

On This Date

HD Daily Report, September 8, 1856

The Lincoln Log, September 8, 1856

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–Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (2 volumes, originally published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008) Unedited Manuscript By Chapters, Lincoln Studies Center, Volume 1, Chapter 11 (PDF), pp. 1213

How Historians Interpret

“Lincoln recognized that the Republican party faced formidable problems in the 1856 presidential contest. Not only was it a new and imperfectly articulated organization, but it had powerful competition. . .The nativists, now calling themselves the American party, nominated ex-President Millard Fillmore, whose highly respectable Whig antecedents made him attractive to conservatives of all persuasions. . .Lincoln offered low-key, reasonable arguments to persuade American voters opposed to the expansion of slavery not to waste their votes on Fillmore, who had no chance of winning. In private letters to old Whig friends, Lincoln made the same argument, stressing that a vote for Fillmore was really a vote for Buchanan. . .What effect Lincoln had on the outcome of the 1856 election in Illinois was hard for him or anybody else to determine. In Republican newspapers his speeches were invariably praised as ‘unanswerable,’ showing ‘great eloquence and power.’ Democratic papers described his speeches as ‘prosy and dull in the extreme.’ He himself was under no illusions about the impact of his campaigning. . .In the end, the canvass verified the prediction Lincoln had made at the start: ‘With the Fremont and Fillmore men united, here in Illinois, we have Mr. Buchanan in the hollow of our hand; but with us divided, . . . he has us.'”

–David Herbert Donald, Lincoln (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995), 192-194

“On September 8, Lincoln wrote a form letter to the supporters of the American party’s candidate, arguing that Fillmore could only win if the election were thrown into the House of Representatives, where the former president might prevail as a compromise candidate. But that would never happen if Buchanan carried Illinois, whose electoral votes, when combined with those of the South and of the Democratic standard bearer’s home state of Pennsylvania, would assure his election. Therefore Fillmore backers in Illinois should vote for Frémont because Fillmore had no chance of carrying the state.”

NOTE TO READERS

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Springfield, Sept. 8, 1856

Dear Sir,

I understand you are a Fillmore man. Let me prove to you that every vote withheld from Fremont, and given to Fillmore, in this state, actually lessens Fillmore’s chance of being President.

Suppose Buchanan gets all the slave states, and Pennsylvania, andany other one state besides; then he is elected, no matter who gets all the rest.

But suppose Fillmore gets the two slave states of Maryland and Kentucky; then Buchanan is not elected; Fillmore goes into the House of Representatives, and may be made President by a compromise.

But suppose again Fillmore’s friends throw away a few thousand votes on him, in Indiana and Illinois, it will inevitably give these states to Buchanan, which will more than compensate him for the loss of Maryland and Kentucky; will elect him, and leave Fillmore no chance in the H.R. or out of it.

This is as plain as the adding up of the weights of three small hogs. As Mr. Fillmore has no possible chance to carry Illinois for himself, it is plainly his interest to let Fremont take it, and thus keep it out of the hands of Buchanan. Be not deceived. Buchanan is the hard horse to beat in this race. Let him have Illinois, and nothing can beat him; and he will get Illinois, if men persist in throwing away votes upon Mr. Fillmore.

Does some one persuade, you that Mr. Fillmore can carry Illinois? Nonsense! There are over seventy newspapers in Illinois opposing Buchanan, only three or four of which support Mr. Fillmore, all the rest going for Fremont. Are not these newspapers a fair index of the proportion of the voters. If not, tell me why.

Again, of these three or four Fillmore newspapers, two at least, are supported, in part, by the Buchanan men, as I understand. Do not they know where the shoe pinches? They know the Fillmore movement helps them, and therefore they help it.

Do think these things over, and then act according to your judgment.

Yours very truly,

A. LINCOLN

(Confidential)

Letter to Jonathan Scammon (November 10, 1854)

Some partial friends are for me for the U.S. Senate; and it would be very foolish, and very false, for me to deny that I would be pleased with an election to that Honorable body. If you know nothing, and feel nothing to the contrary, please mark for me with the members.

Ranking

#123 on the list of 150 Most Teachable Lincoln Documents

Annotated Transcript

On This Date

HD Daily Report, November 10, 1854

The Lincoln Log, November 10, 1854

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—Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life (2 volumes, originally published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008) Unedited Manuscript By Chapter, Lincoln Studies Center, Volume 1, Chapter 10 (PDF), pp. 1123-1125

How Historians Interpret

“Lincoln, Herndon recalled, was ‘ambitious to reach the United States Senate, and, warmly encouraged in his aspirations by his wife,’ campaigned for the post with ‘his characteristic activity and vigilance. During the anxious moments that intervened between the general election [in November] and the assembling of the Legislature [in January] he slept, like Napoleon, with one eye open.’ Three days after the November election, Lincoln began writing a torrent of letters asking support for his senate bid. On November 10, he appealed to Charles Hoyt of Aurora: ‘You used to express a good deal of partiality for me; and if you are still so, now is the time. Some friends here are really for me, for the U.S. Senate; and I should be very grateful if you could make a mark for me among your members.’ That same day, he told Jonathan Y. Scammon of Chicago that ‘Some partial friends here are for me for the U.S. Senate; and it would be very foolish, and very false, for me to deny that I would be pleased with an election to that Honorable body. If you know nothing, and feel nothing to the contrary, please make a mark for me with the members.’ The following day he asked Jacob Harding of Paris to visit his legislator and “make a mark with him for me,’ for ‘I really have some chance.’ Later that month, he appealed to Thomas J. Henderson of Toulon: ‘It has come round that a whig may, by possibility, be elected to the U.S. Senate; and I want the chance of being the man. You are a member of the Legislature, and have a vote to give. Think it over, and see whether you can do better than to go for me.’ The following month, he wrote Joseph Gillespie: ‘I have really got it into my head to try to be United States Senator; and if I could have your support my chances would be reasonably good.'”

“Lincoln was dismissive of nativism at least in private, and most of his biographers have quoted a handful of his now famous letters to figures such as political activist Owen Lovejoy and old friend Joshua Speed in the mid-1850s that contained some moving denunciations of nativist prejudice. Yet the new documents from the post-Collected Works period also illustrate how Boss Lincoln was also apparently able to compartmentalize his personal views whenever it came to the necessities of managing the party machinery. Lincoln’s outreach to Know Nothings, Americans, and former Fillmore men was not only persistent but also at times subtle. Consider this rarely cited 1854 note from the First Supplement (1974) to Chicago attorney and businessman Jonathan Y. Scammon. . . ‘If you know nothing, and feel nothing to the contrary.’ Such a confidential double entendre might have been a mere coincidence, but most likely it was a clever pun intended to create some ambiguity as to whether or not Lincoln was kidding around or trying to signal implicit sympathy with the Know Nothings. Scammon cautiously declined to answer in writing, promising instead to ‘communicate personally.’ Scammon’s ties to the nativist movement, if any, remain murky, although all that really matters here is what Lincoln might have believed.”

—Matthew Pinsker, “Boss Lincoln: A Reappraisal of Abraham Lincoln’s Party Leadership,” in The Living Lincoln, ed. by Thomas A. Horrocks, Harold Holzer, and Frank J. Williams (Carbondale: Souther Illinois University Press, 2011), 25-26

NOTE TO READERS

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November 10, 1854

J.Y.Scammon, Esq

My dear Sir:

Let this be confidential.

Yours as ever,

A. Lincoln

Letter to Joshua Speed (August 24, 1855)

“I am not a Know-Nothing. That is certain. How could I be? How can any one who abhors the oppression of negroes, be in favor of degrading classes of white people? Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declaring that ‘all men are created equal.’ We now practically read it ‘all men are created equal, except negroes.’ When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read ‘all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and catholics.’ When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretence of loving liberty—to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocracy.”

Contributing Editors for this page include Jonas Sherr

Ranking

#138 on the list of 150 Most Teachable Lincoln Documents

Annotated Transcript

On This Date

HD Daily Report, August 24, 1855

The Lincoln Log, August 24, 1855

Close Readings

Jonas Sherr, “Understanding Lincoln” blog post (via Quora), Sep. 30, 2013

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How Historians Interpret

“In response to Speed’s professed willingness to dissolve the Union if the rights of slaveholders were violated, Lincoln said that he would not attempt to do so if the tables were turned and Kansas were admitted as a Slave State. To be sure, Speed had expressed the hope that Kansas would be admitted as a Free State; but, Lincoln rejoined, slaveholders’ deeds belied their words. ‘All decent slave-holders talk that way; and I do not doubt their candor. But they never vote that way.’ In private correspondence or conversation, ‘you will express your preference that Kansas shall be free,’ but ‘you would vote for no man for Congress who would say the same thing publicly.’ Echoing his 1854 Peoria address, Lincoln told his old friend that ‘slave-breeders and slave traders, are a small, odious and detested class, among you; and yet in politics, they dictate the course of all of you, and are as completely your masters, as you are the masters of your own negroes.’ Though dubious about the prospects for a free Kansas, Lincoln said he would work for that cause: ‘In my humble sphere, I shall advocate the restoration of the Missouri Compromise, so long as Kansas remains a territory; and when, by all these foul means, it seeks to come into the Union as a Slave-state, I shall oppose it.'”

“Lincoln’s frequent assertions of his Whig loyalty echoed a similar commitment to party policies, values and outlook. As Daniel Howe has suggested, Lincoln’s Whiggery ‘sprang from the very depths of his being’ and remained an intense, deeply imbedded part of him. That is why it was so difficult for Lincoln to leave the Whig party in the fifties. He hesitated even as political conditions changed sharply and the party’s fortunes collapsed. He continued to say, ‘I think I am a whig,’ even when others suggested that there no longer were any Whigs. For a long time he claimed that he saw no reason to join a new party.”

— Joel H. Silbey, “’Always a Whig in Politics’ The Partisan Life of Abraham Lincoln,” Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association 8, no. 1 (1986): 21-42.

“Lincoln had nothing but disdain for the discriminatory beliefs of the Know Nothings. ‘How can any one who abhors the oppression of negroes, be in favor of degrading classes of white people?’ he queried his friend Joshua Speed. ‘Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declaring that ‘all men are created equal.’ We now practically read it ‘all men are created equal, except negroes.’ When Know-Nothings get control, it will read ‘all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and catholics.’ When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretence of loving liberty—to Russia, for instance.’ But this party, too, was soon to founder on the issue of slavery. Many Northern Know Nothings were also antislavery, and finally the anti-Nebraska cause proved more compelling, of more import, than resistance to foreign immigration.”

–Doris Kearns Goodwin, Team of Rivals (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005), 180-181.

NOTE TO READERS

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Springfield, Aug: 24, 1855

Dear Speed:

You know what a poor correspondent I am. Ever since I received your very agreeable letter of the 22nd. of May I have been intending to write you in answer to it. You suggest that in political action now, you and I would differ. I suppose we would; not quite as much, however, as you may think. You know I dislike slavery; and you fully admit the abstract wrong of it. So far there is no cause of difference. But you say that sooner than yield your legal right to the slave—especially at the bidding of those who are not themselves interested, you would see the Union dissolved. I am not aware that any one is bidding you to yield that right; very certainly I am not. I leave that matter entirely to yourself. I also acknowledge your rights and my obligations, under the constitution, in regard to your slaves. I confess I hate to see the poor creatures hunted down, and caught, and carried back to their stripes, and unrewarded toils; but I bite my lip and keep quiet. In 1841 you and I had together a tedious low-water trip, on a Steam Boat from Louisville to St. Louis. You may remember, as I well do, that from Louisville to the mouth of the Ohio there were, on board, ten or a dozen slaves, shackled together with irons. That sight was a continual torment to me; and I see something like it every time I touch the Ohio, or any other slave-border. It is hardly fair for you to assume, that I have no interest in a thing which has, and continually exercises, the power of making me miserable. You ought rather to appreciate how much the great body of the Northern people do crucify their feelings, in order to maintain their loyalty to the constitution and the Union.

I do oppose the extension of slavery, because my judgment and feelings so prompt me; and I am under no obligation to the contrary. If for this you and I must differ, differ we must. You say if you were President, you would send an army and hang the leaders of the Missouri outrages upon the Kansas elections; still, if Kansas fairly votes herself a slave state, she must be admitted, or the Union must be dissolved. But how if she votes herself a slave state unfairly—that is, by the very means for which you say you would hang men? Must she still be admitted, or the Union be dissolved? That will be the phase of the question when it first becomes a practical one. In your assumption that there may be a fair decision of the slavery question in Kansas, I plainly see you and I would differ about the Nebraska-law. I look upon that enactment not as a law, but as violence from the beginning. It was conceived in violence, passed in violence, is maintained in violence, and is being executed in violence. I say it was conceived in violence, because the destruction of the Missouri Compromise, under the circumstances, was nothing less than violence. It was passed in violence, because it could not have passed at all but for the votes of many members, in violent disregard of the known will of their constituents. It is maintained in violence because the elections since, clearly demand it’s repeal, and this demand is openly disregarded. You say men ought to be hung for the way they are executing that law; and I say the way it is being executed is quite as good as any of its antecedents. It is being executed in the precise way which was intended from the first; else why does no Nebraska man express astonishment or condemnation? Poor Reeder is the only public man who has been silly enough to believe that any thing like fairness was ever intended; and he has been bravely undeceived.

That Kansas will form a Slave constitution, and, with it, will ask to be admitted into the Union, I take to be an already settled question; and so settled by the very means you so pointedly condemn. By every principle of law, ever held by any court, North or South, every negro taken to Kansas is free; yet in utter disregard of this—in the spirit of violence merely—that beautiful Legislature gravely passes a law to hang men who shall venture to inform a negro of his legal rights. This is the substance, and real object of the law. If, like Haman, they should hang upon the gallows of their own building, I shall not be among the mourners for their fate.

In my humble sphere, I shall advocate the restoration of the Missouri Compromise, so long as Kansas remains a territory; and when, by all these foul means, it seeks to come into the Union as a Slave-state, I shall oppose it. I am very loth, in any case, to withhold my assent to the enjoyment of property acquired, or located, in good faith; but I do not admit that good faith, in taking a negro to Kansas, to be held in slavery, is a possibility with any man. Any man who has sense enough to be the controller of his own property, has too much sense to misunderstand the outrageous character of this whole Nebraska business. But I digress. In my opposition to the admission of Kansas I shall have some company; but we may be beaten. If we are, I shall not, on that account, attempt to dissolve the Union. On the contrary, if we succeed, there will be enough of us to take care of the Union. I think it probable, however, we shall be beaten. Standing as a unit among yourselves, you can, directly, and indirectly, bribe enough of our men to carry the day—as you could on an open proposition to establish monarchy. Get hold of some man in the North, whose position and ability is such, that he can make the support of your measure—whatever it may be—a democratic party necessity, and the thing is done. Appropos of this, let me tell you an anecdote. Douglas introduced the Nebraska bill in January. In February afterwards, there was a call session of the Illinois Legislature. Of the one hundred members composing the two branches of that body, about seventy were democrats. These latter held a caucus, in which the Nebraska bill was talked of, if not formally discussed. It was thereby discovered that just three, and no more, were in favor of the measure. In a day or two Douglas’ orders came on to have resolutions passed approving the bill; and they were passed by large majorities!!! The truth of this is vouched for by a bolting democratic member. The masses too, democratic as well as whig, were even, nearer unanamous against it; but as soon as the party necessity of supporting it, became apparent, the way the democracy began to see the wisdom and justice of it, was perfectly astonishing.

You say if Kansas fairly votes herself a free state, as a christian you will rather rejoice at it. All decent slave-holders talk that way; and I do not doubt their candor. But they never vote that way. Although in a private letter, or conversation, you will express your preference that Kansas shall be free, you would vote for no man for Congress who would say the same thing publicly. No such man could be elected from any district in any slave-state. You think Stringfellow & Co ought to be hung; and yet, at the next presidential election you will vote for the exact type and representative of Stringfellow. The slave-breeders and slave-traders, are a small, odious and detested class, among you; and yet in politics, they dictate the course of all of you, and are as completely your masters, as you are the masters of your own negroes.

You enquire where I now stand. That is a disputed point. I think I am a whig; but others say there are no whigs, and that I am an abolitionist. When I was at Washington I voted for the Wilmot Proviso as good as forty times, and I never heard of any one attempting to unwhig me for that. I now do no more than oppose the extension of slavery.

I am not a Know-Nothing. That is certain. How could I be? How can any one who abhors the oppression of negroes, be in favor of degrading classes of white people? Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declaring that “all men are created equal.” We now practically read it “all men are created equal, except negroes.” When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read “all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and catholics.” When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretence of loving liberty—to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocracy.

Mary will probably pass a day or two in Louisville in October. My kindest regards to Mrs. Speed. On the leading subject of this letter, I have more of her sympathy than I have of yours.

And yet let [me] say I am Your friend forever

A. LINCOLN—

Letter to Abraham Jonas (July 21, 1860)

“I suppose as good, or even better, men than I may have been in American, or Know-Nothing lodges; but in point of fact, I never was in one, at Quincy, or elsewhere. I was never in Quincy but one day and two nights, while Know-Nothing lodges were in existence, and you were with me that day and both those nights.”

Contributing Editors for this page include Jonas Sherr

Ranking

#144 on the list of 150 Most Teachable Lincoln Documents

Annotated Transcript

On This Date

HD Daily Report, July 21, 1860

The Lincoln Log, July 21, 1860

Close Readings

Jonas Sherr, “Understanding Lincoln” blog post (via Quora), Sep. 29, 2013

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